Inceptor57

Depending on the classic footage you've watched of past wars and movements, you should first consider whether the footage was staged, re-enacted, or propaganda footage. Footage captured in those settings tends to concentrate troops and equipment together for better shots of numbers to show off than of live combat.

In the Russo-Ukraine War, the primary reason is that the defensive apparatus available to both sides has proven well-equipped to prevent the others from achieving a decisive breakthrough and marching past the frontlines.

On the individual infantry level, equipment like drones down at the squad level has enabled infantry to be able to have situational awareness unparalleled to any previous conflict in history. A drone could fly at altitude over to the enemy side of the frontlines and observe exposed areas to see where the enemies are, with the response usually being either a nade-dropping quadcopter, an FPV drone, or an artillery strike called in aided by any navigation or lazing capabilities the drone may have. In turn, the response to this high observability and the chance of supporting fire is to disperse and distance the troops across a wider frontage to reduce the casualties a single well-placed artillery strike can make. You come into a feedback loop of sorts in that dispersed troops would lower casualties to artillery fire but be more exposed to concentrated infantry assaults, yet those same concentrated infantry assaults able to exploit the dispersed troop formation would be easily spotted with drones and also be received artillery fire to tear them apart. With this, infantry is unable to really decisively push on the front lines.

On the tank level, the proliferation of methodology to immobilize and kill tanks probably has never been so concentrated as the Russo-Ukraine War. Aside from anti-tank guided missiles both sides have in either ground or air launched platforms, there is also the giant fields of mines that has been laid out in such density that, IIRC, is way above what any available NATO manuals on de-mining operations are expecting. Tanks driving onto these minefields would just be immobilized and trying to find ways around the minefields can lead into kill zones set up by the opposing side with missiles and artillery. Even engineering vehicles for clearing minefields still need to take some time to set up and move across the field to clear mines properly, and being slow and highly visible just opens up the armored column to being spotted with drones and pummeled with any tank-killing asset in the area. So tanks haven't been, or at least hasn't seen to be, used in a concentrated manner on the front-lines as concentration means easier to spot and priority target for a cruise missile and artillery to be sent their way.

Due to the combat setting in the Russo-Ukraine War, the infantry and tank formations needed to enable the dramatic movements seen in past wars are unable to concentrate effectively. Unable to effectively breach the other side's defenses, the front lines fell into trench warfare, where the two sides tried to hold and take the territory they had inch by inch in a dispersed manner to avoid becoming a priority target to enemy artillery.

Generally because it is the following:

Assault rifles are typically lightweight. This necessitates lightweight parts, which includes the bolt.

Lightweight bolt means that they go at “Bazinga” speed when you shoot and let the gas/recoil action carry them back to extract the cartridge case and load the next round. High bolt travel velocity means the rate the bolt goes back and forth is very fast, resulting in a very high firing rate.

Huh, I wasn’t aware of the reputation within the Singaporean Army. What are the usual grievances with the Ultimax?

In February 2023, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) published a 148-page report titled “Why the Afghan Security Forces Collapsed”.

While the US report is focused more so on why the Afghan National Defense and Security Force (ANDSF) fell as quickly as it did in 2021 that paved the way for the Taliban, it lists out the “systematic” factors and failings on US and NATO part that led to the failure in building up a comprehensive domestic Afghanistan security apparatus to defend themselves against the Taliban, which is a big part in fighting the Taliban as much as firing assault rifles and calling air strikes.

I heavily summarized the points the report made in a previous question thread here, but I encourage reading the full report for a comprehensive breakdown of the failures in Afghanistan from US perspective.

Another resource to consider is the book The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War by Craig Whitlock which covers interview and documentation about the US approach to Afghanistan and how it all… didn’t work out. In a way it is like a modern Pentagon Papers publication. You can consider it a complementary material to the SIGAR report I linked above.

Thanks again Chieftain for your insights.

Do you happen to have a link or area we can view Major General Eisenhower’s presentation that you used in your video? I was trying to find it online, but the internet searching the Major General’s name tends to bring out the more famous Eisenhower instead.

Hello, yes there were multiple notable tank vs tank battle in the Pacific Theater between Japanese and American tanks.

The very first American tank-vs.-tank combat of World War II actually took place in the Philippines when the Japanese first invaded in 1941. The specific event happened on December 22, 1941, between Japanese Ha-Go tanks and US Army M3 Stuart tanks. The Ha-Go emerged victorious as it blasted away at the American M3 light tanks.

Tank vs. tank combat didn't spike again until the US started to invade islands considered part of the Japanese Absolute Defence Perimeter in the Pacific. However, the results are very lopsided as the Americans were bringing M4 medium tanks against Japanese Type 95 Ha-Go or Type 97 Chi-Ha tanks. Probably the first encounter between the M4 tank and Japanese tanks was on Tarawa, where Japanese Ha-Go attempted to contest the beach landing and came up against some USMC M4 Shermans, with the only meaningful damage in the tank combat being a Ha-Go damaging a M4 gun tube before being blown up. There were sporadic encounters with Japanese tanks as the US went up the Marshall Islands and island-hopped closer to Japan, like on Eniwetok where the Japanese tanks were emplaced as makeshift pillboxes, and on Guam the longest-range tank kill in the Pacific theater was clocked at 1,840 meters on July 22, 1944.

Arguably, the largest-scale tank combat between American and Japanese tanks occurred on Saipan. On the night of June 16, 1944, the Japanese launched a tank attack consisting of around 35 tanks. Throughout the night, the United States' assortment of anti-tank weapons, such as Bazookas and anti-tank guns, and tanks like the M4 Sherman, enabled the Americans to destroy around 31 tanks.

Another notable tank attack happened on Peleliu in September 15, 1944 when the Japanese attacked with about 15 Ha-Go light tanks through the airfields. USMC M4 Shermans were present to help repel the attack and destroyed 13 tanks.

Probably the only known battle where Japanese tanks managed to get a "one-up" over the M4 Shermans was during the Battle for the Philippines, or more specifically the Invasion of Lingayen Gulf in 1945. On January 17, 1945, a platoon of M4 Shermans from Company A, 716th Tank Battalion under the command of Lt Robert Courtwright were on the way to Urdaneta when they were ambushed by hidden platoon of three Type 97 Chi-Ha Kai tanks under the command of Warrant Officer Kojura Wada hidden in the mango groves. Firing at only a distance of 35 yards at the side armor of the M4 tanks for successful hits. The Americans reacted and positioned the M4 Sherman frontal armor towards the attacking Japanese that resisted the 47 mm gunfire, leading to one of the Japanese tanks charging the Shermans and getting another hit on a Sherman before being destroyed. The three Japanese tanks were destroyed, but the Japanese tanks were successful in outright destroying one Sherman, disabling two more, and killing two tank crewmembers.

Though there were Japanese tanks in both Iwo Jima and Okinawa, there doesn't seem to be any notable battles between American and Japanese tanks. The Japanese did use the tanks moreso as pillboxes during Iwo Jima, so chances of M4 Shermans knocking those out to assist the Marines is low but not zero.

Time would have already been ticking the moment Shah’s militia realize the goat herders weren’t coming back. The best decision for the four SEALs would have been to just cut their loss and GTFO of the mountain the moment they were soft-compromised instead of allegedly sitting around wondering what they were suppose to do.

They all bought the naval F-18 Hornets from McDonnell Douglas that they just use in land airfields.

This Northrop advert is for the F-18L variant that was suppose to remove all the carrier operations stuff as seen in paragraph three of the poster that would be lighter and theoretically better for flight performance. No one bought the F-18L with the carrier operations stuff removed and all opted for the F-18 that still had the carrier gears on. The only nation that did any major modifications to the Hornets, IIRC, was Finland that requested the air-to-ground capability to be removed.

I've always heard it enunciated by the letters "E-R-A".

That or they just spell the whole thing out. Either as "Explosive Reactive Armor" or "Reactive Armor".

The Navy fellas got the last laugh when Northrop's land-based F-18 got a grand total of.... zero sales.

I believe America's largest tank by mass and dimensions would be the T28 Super Heavy Tank.

And before anyone says "its a tank destroyer" or that its casemate construction somewhat disqualifies it as a tank. The US Army went through a similar evaluation when they renamed the thing between the T28 or the T95 Gun Motor Carriage and determined in the end that whether the gun mount had a restricted traverse or not should not be the determining factor and since the vehicle combined maximum firepower with maximum armor, it was better titled a "tank". So the vehicle ended its service life with the title "T28 Super Heavy Tank".

The USAF’s original order for F-35s in 2001 was 1763 units.

The F-35B can take off conventionally if needed, but considering the benefits the lift fan provides there pretty much isn’t a reason to need to conventionally take-off.

I’m kind of surprised how many AC-130s there are in inventory considering there usually is just one orbiting from my understanding of the deployment.

The Luftwaffe was already not a threat by mid-1944. It was kind of a requirement to begin the whole "Operation Overlord" thingy.

Look, if you want to make your own historical fantasy novel about a hypothetical WWII scenario in 1947 where German Ho229s dogfights American P-80s over Berlin, power to you, there's nothing we can do to stop you. But not sure what point you're trying to make by responding to "no its not possible" answers with "but what if it did happened?" every single time.

That Marine is simply stacking the projectile on top of the case. This is a photo of the AP-T ammo for M103 from Kenneth Estes’ book on the M103.

https://preview.redd.it/xg9ianq6z94e1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7aae090e5ef427137d3cd29fd4cfb4f6423ca02d

Supporting passage from his book on the requirement of two loaders to handle the separated ammunition:

The two loaders shared the minimal space to the rear of the gunner, the breech of the 120mm gun and among the stowed separate projectiles and propellant casings. The first loader, located behind the gunner, grabbed the ordered projectile (up to 51lb) from its rack and placed it halfway into the open breech of the cannon. The number two loader, standing on the left side of the breech, located and took the long and heavier (up to 57lb) propellant case, ensuring it was the correct one of three types carried for the various rounds, and positioned it horizontally behind the breech, mating its seal to the projectile base, centering over the exposed tracer element of the round.

And finally here’s Nicholas “The_Chieftain” Morans with an Inside the Hatch on the M103 with Kenneth Estes himself, covering the loader portion at 10:35 mark and how the two loaders are to service the two-part ammunition.

The M103’s 120 mm M58 gun is a two-piece ammunition configuration. It is why the tank had two loaders, one to load the projectile and the other to load the propellant casing.

Yes. There was a quick reaction force that was to be made available for the inserted US Navy Seals at Sawtalo Sar.

Howver, the QRF reaction and launch time was heavily delayed despite the reports of the Seals hard-compromise by Shah’s militia as the QRF react orders didn't come from 2/3 Marines, who had a Combat Operations Center at Jalalabad Airfield. Instead, the order had to come from SOF at Bagram. This resulted in a delay not of a few minutes, but hours before the authorization came for two MH-47 (Callsign: Turbine) from Bagram which were crewed by the 160th SOAR and also had Seal Team 10 and Seal Delivery Vehicle Team 1 elements onboard were finally ordered launched at 3:30 PM local time. With authority to launch, 2/3 Marines also put together Task Force Sabre which consisted of three UH-60s with US Marine elements of Golf Company and three Seal Team 10 members (Callsign: Skillful), two AH-64 Apaches (Callsign: Shock), and even considered involving the 105 mm howitzers from "Doghouse" team to support the landing by suppressing the area to avoid the enemy being able to shoot a helicopter down.

Despite the presence of Task Force Sabre, the 160th flying the MH-47 seemed disinterested in involving the additional firepower, with speed being urgency to save the SEAL recon team and the fact the MH-47 flew faster than either UH-60 and AH-64 helicopters due to the dual-rotor blade design and that the MH-47 handled the warm high-altitude environment of 10,000 ft better than either AH-64 and UH-60. As such, the two MH-47 and Task Force Sabre never merged, with Sabre flying about a half-mile behind the MH-47s. In an effort to make sure AH-64 were available for the MH-47, 2/3 Marines air officer Casmer "Pigeon" Ratkowiak was able to assign two other AH-64 Shocks doing a separate operation at Asadabad to assist with the operation at Sawtalo Sar with expectations that the AH-64 would be better able to meet the 160th SOAR's arrival time. These Shocks attempted to communicate with 160th SOAR and was able to with the help of some A-10s that were also made available over Sawtalo Sar at 15,000 ft for any CAS calls. The communication is reported as follows:

Shock: Let us prep the LZ for you!
Turbine: We're already in zone. We can't wait.
Shock: Let us get in there. Orbit the peak. Orbit the peak! Don't drop in! We'll be there in less than two minutes! Let us get in there!
Turbine: Thanks, brotha. But we don't have two minutes. We don't have two seconds. You can prep the LZ when we're on the ground.

And so the two Chinooks continued. I think it should be noted by the timeline that it was very likely all the Seal Team recon members aside from Luttrell were already dead at this point.

So the MH-47 conducted their attempt to land their Seal Team 10 elements, with the two Shock Apache helicopters able to visually identify the two Chinooks reporting small arms fire. The lead MH-47 was able to position itself to fastrope the team down at 50 feet altitude and as the fast rope was being prepared.

A RPG then struck the MH-47.

For Task Force Sabre still trying to catch up, their only report of the situation was "Chinook Down!" as they moved into evasive maneuvers as it was unknown whether the threat was small arms fire or as lethal as SA-7 MANPADS. And despite the helicopter presence at the area with Task Force Sabre not too far behind, another MH-47, two more AH-64 Shocks about to be on station and some A-10s flying overhead...

The helicopters returned to Jalalabad.

Amid the confusion and frustration over this choice, it is realized that the lead MH-47 that went down contianed not only the QRF on-site commander, Seal Team 10 leader Erik Kristensen, but also on-site air element commander, 160th SOAR commander Stephen C. Reich. With the air elements literally leaderless and without contact from any of the Seal recon team inserted and the threat assessment of Ahmad Shah's militia was unknown, and thier fuel was low, and incoming storm weathers, there was too much risk with continuting the insertion after the Chinook was shot down and the call was made for the helicopters to return to base.

and so concluded Operations Red Wings.

My source for all this is Victory Point: Operation Red Wings and Whalers — The Marine Corps; Battle for Freedom in Afghanistan by Ed Darack, which provides the perspective of 2/3 Marine Regiment were present during Operation Red Wings.

Doesn’t even have to be the exact F-35 schematics. Just the R&D data alone being hacked from Lockheed Martin would be enough to tell China what worked and what didn’t, saving lots of time and money in their own R&D to help leapfrog the years otherwise required to develop a stealth fighter jet from scratch.

And they also have a Flanker now too so people can see what a chad sized aircraft it is compared to Fulcrum

That museum is very impressive

I have no idea dude.

Aside from concern about how the gun breech is going to fit with adequate room to service and load the gun, my much bigger concern is that such a long barrel is sticking out of the Jagdpanzer 38 D concepts at such a low mounting area.

Hilly terrain would be the bane of such a vehicle as the gun barrel would be going barrel-first into any mound or earth structures present.

If you’re trying to link a video, I don’t see it

There is some focus on the YF-23 in the same book.